


clinging to the skin of the world

by zombeesknees



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-10
Updated: 2018-12-10
Packaged: 2019-09-15 11:26:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,105
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16932414
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zombeesknees/pseuds/zombeesknees
Summary: The Doctor, Rose, 1942 Arizona. A Route 66 road trip that encounters some unexpected detours. | Written for Challenge 10 at then_theres_us on LJ many moons ago.





	clinging to the skin of the world

The Earth was always spinning.

She knew this. She’d known it as a child; he’d reminded her that long-ago-yet-so-close day on a simple street corner two blocks from her old flat. Hell, she’s seen the tilt of the earth, thousands of miles out in space, as the TARDIS hovered in a wellspring of time and cosmic energy. 

Some days, though. 

Everything. 

Just. 

Stood. 

Still. 

Days when the heat was so heavy it was a scratchy woolen blanket across the shoulders. When the weight of everything settled into the grooves and depressions, and time had the consistency of cold molasses.

They’d found themselves hitchhiking along a forsaken stretch of highway in 1942 Arizona. She felt the heat of her newly acquired sunburn as it blazed its way down her shoulders and across her arms, the stickiness of her sweat as it trickled along her spine, and she sighed. Not even the handkerchief she’d tied around her head tempered the glare of the desert. The bag she was carrying, stuffed full of the necessary traveling accoutrements, was weighing her down almost as much as the infernal heat.

How in the bloody hell did he manage it in that polyester suit of his? 

This was all her fault, really. _She_ was the one who suggested a road trip. _She_ was the one who wanted to buy the used Ford truck at the edge of the dealer’s lot. When the blasted thing had given up the ghost four miles back, not even the Doctor’s screwdriver proved much help. Was it really possible for an automobile to have more rust in its engine than oil?

And here they were, trudging down a barren highway, with only tumbleweeds and telephone poles for company. For the first two miles the Doctor had tried to keep her spirits up, nattering away about the local flora and fauna and pointing out humorously shaped cacti. But Rose’s black mood had started before the truck had finally spluttered to a complete stop, and she refused to be swayed into good humor. He’d started humming quietly to himself and had fallen back a few paces, to let her fume in peace.

Just why she was feeling so prickly escaped her. It was somewhat bothering, niggling in the back of her mind the way a child fusses with a loose, bloody tooth. The sharp tang of disappointment had filled her mouth. Her expectations had not been met. This outing, the first one she’d really planned for them, was an abysmal failure. But there was something else, too, something she couldn’t quite put her finger—

The Doctor’s ear-splitting whistle made her flinch in surprise. She turned with a cold chastisement on her tongue, which died as soon as she saw the cause of his whistle. 

A car. 

The Doctor bounced frantically on the highway’s shoulder, waving his arms. “Alms, sir, alms! Just two poor stranded travelers, in need of transpo!”

Rose felt her heart lift from the general vicinity of her knees. The car was slowing down, drifting slightly towards them. She ran after the Doctor, who was leaning over to address the driver through the open window.

“You the owner of that busted up junker way back there?” asked the driver, a red-faced man with an unfortunate haircut. 

“Indeed we are. It failed us this morning.”

“Got yourselves in a pickle, huh? Next town is fifteen miles away. You’d be walking for another two days, rate you’re going. Where you headed?”

“Where ever the wind takes us, really,” the Doctor said with his disarming smile, hands shoved into his suit pockets.

“Well, I’m headed to Yuma. You’re welcomed to hitch a ride, if you want. Name’s Roger Cowen.”

The words had barely left the man’s mouth before the Doctor had flung open the back door and slid across the worn vinyl seat. Rose quickly followed, incredibly grateful to be out of the sun’s direct glare. 

“Pleased to meet you, Roger. I’m the Doctor and this is Rose Tyler.” 

“A doctor, huh? What kind?”

“Every kind. I’m a student of the universe, really.”

“Interesting accent you’ve got. You a Brit?”

“Yes,” Rose said, untying her handkerchief and shaking out her hair. “We were hoping to take Route 66 all the way to Chicago, do some sight-seeing along the way.”

“Got out of Europe while the gettin’ was good, huh? Don’t blame you.” It took Rose a moment to remember the year. “So you two married?”

“Rose is my companion,” the Doctor said blithely, slinging one long arm over the windowsill, stretching his fingers out into the hot wind as it rushed past the car. “A traveling friend, if you will. Looking for adventure and whatever else the universe wants to throw our way.” 

“Uh-huh.” The way Roger glanced back at them in the rearview mirror, Rose decided he had traditional views about unchaperoned young women who traveled with older men. Considering their luck today, Rose didn’t want to risk losing their ride.

“He says the oddest things sometimes,” she said quickly, putting her hand on the Doctor’s knee. He turned to look at her intently, his expression unreadable. “Yes, we’re married. And you, Roger? Are you a family man?”

“Sure am,” he said with a touch of pride. “Goin’ on thirteen years now. Got three boys back home: Jack, John, and James.”

“Fond of the Js, eh?” the Doctor said. His hand had closed over Rose’s, and she was once again reminded of how different he was—in this heat, in a stifling backseat of a car that smelled strongly of cheap cigar smoke, her entire body was drenched with sweat. And yet his hand, pressed softly against hers, was cool and dry. She could almost feel her body trying to draw the chill from his skin. 

“That’s my wife Janice’s doing,” Roger said. “It’s an old family tradition with the Prewetts. Four generations back now, every one of them a J.”

“Fascinating,” said the Doctor. Rose could tell he was functioning on autopilot; his voice had lost its sharpness and his eyes had glazed slightly. He had turned his attentions inward, and was obviously puzzling something over. 

Luckily, Roger wasn’t nearly so observant and he continued to prattle on about his family, his job as a salesman, the long commute, the unusual coyote behavior this summer. Occasionally the Doctor would murmur a response, or Rose would pick up the slack, but the backseat was very quiet.

The Doctor’s thumb slowly drew circles on the back of her hand.

 

They stopped for the night in a nameless town that had a single motel. Rose unfolded herself from the small backseat and stretched until her back had popped to her satisfaction, unaware that the Doctor was staring at her as he slid out of the car. 

“Well, this is my stop for the night,” Roger said. “There’s a dealership a couple blocks over, if you’ve got the cash for another car. Otherwise, there’s an interstate bus that comes through twice a day. Or you could tag along a bit further. Got another half a day or so till I get to Yuma.”

“We’ll see how we feel in the morning, eh?” the Doctor said, picking up Rose’s bag. 

“Sounds dandy. I’ll be ready to hit the road around eight. Just meet me here if you’re still in need of a lift.” Roger nodded brusquely and made his way to the motel’s office.

After Roger had signed in, there was only one room left. Rose wrote their names in as Dr. and Mrs. Rose Tyler, counted out their wrinkled bills, and accepted the tarnished key the man at the front desk held out. 

When the door’s lock had clicked, Rose glanced over her shoulder at the Doctor, who had spread himself out across the single bed. “So, come clean. What’s got you thinking so hard?”

“Can’t really say.” He stared up at the ceiling, which was only slightly cobwebby. For a motel, this place wasn’t too bad. At least Rose felt she could shower without fear of a flannel-wearing madman. 

“You? At a loss for words?” Rose scoffed, rummaging in her bag. 

“There are a lot of things,” the Doctor said quietly. “All sort of swirling about in this untidy jumble, stumbling into one another like tipsy drunks.”

“Like?”

“The fallibility of human machines. The complexities of human behavior and society. The silly way you lot have evolved. You live on a planet that can reach temperatures of one hundred and fifty degrees Fahrenheit and yet your bodies can hardly withstand half that heat. It’s remarkably inefficient.”

“Well, sorry about that,” Rose said flippantly, arching an eyebrow. “I’ll be sure to submit that complaint to the boss.”

“Why did you tell Roger we were married?”

Rose paused, toothbrush in hand. “Because he struck me as the sort of bloke who has _opinions_ about relationships like ours. I didn’t want to lose our only ride.”

“Relationships like ours?”

“You know what I mean, Doctor,” Rose said quickly, glancing around the room. “Damn it. No AC.” 

“The temperature’s already dropping,” the Doctor said. She heard the bed creak as he stood. “This is the desert, after all. It can drop to almost freezing in some places, even in midsummer.” He was standing just behind her. “I’m curious, Rose Tyler, as to how you view our relationship.”

“We’re friends,” Rose said, willing her voice to steady. The nearness of him, the ghost of his aftershave, the way his voice had dropped—it had all combined to form something new and different and more than a little thrilling. 

“Friends?”

“More than friends,” she heard herself say. “I don’t think they have a word for what we are.”

“Why were you in such a bad mood this morning?” His question was such a non sequitur, she felt quite off-balanced.

“Because the truck broke down,” she said with the intonation that clearly conveyed _isn’t it obvious?_ , “and we had to walk four miles.”

“You were under a cloud before then,” he said firmly. He still hadn’t moved, still stood within inches of touching her. “You’ve been distant since we stepped out of the TARDIS in Los Angeles.”

And there it was. That feeling she’d been trying to understand all day, the sense that there was something bothering her that she’d forgotten. She remembered where it had started. While looking up information on Route 66, she’d found a grainy black and white photo of a happy couple kissing under one of the iconic signs. The man had been in a striped suit; the blonde woman had been in a pale dress. And it had struck her at that moment: all Rose wanted was to have the Doctor kiss her like that in front of a photographer. She wanted an iconic kiss from _her_ man in a striped suit, captured for all time and left in some archive or history book for future generations to smile at with nostalgia.

She turned, opened her mouth to give him some excuse—or perhaps to tell him the truth—but words failed her when she looked into his face, met those dark eyes she knew better than anyone else’s. There was a deep longing laid bare on his face, a hungry look in those eyes. She put a hand to his cheek, her pinkie brushing against that freckle on his jawline that she loved so much.

“I was in a bad mood because I wanted so badly to kiss you, but wasn’t sure if I should.”

For a moment, she thought he was going to answer her, or step away. But then his hands were at her waist and he was pushing her back against the wall, his mouth coming down on hers with almost frightening force. She gasped against his lips, wrapped an arm around his neck, gathered a handful of his shirt. Her toothbrush dropped soundlessly to the carpet. 

He was lifting her up; she was wrapping her legs around his waist. The feel of his body between her legs was exhilarating. A rush of endorphins threatened to overwhelm her. Only the presence of the unrelenting, solid wall against her back kept her tied to the real world. And then even that was gone as they somehow made their way to the bed. Then there was nothing but _him_ in her world; no rusty trucks, no humorously shaped cacti, no Route 66 signs, no photographs. Only the breathtakingly cool presence of his skin, the arousing brush of his lips against her shoulder, the shivering feel of his long fingers tracing circles down her back, the—

The Earth was spinning again.


End file.
